


otabek-altin started following you

by elumish



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: M/M, Pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-03
Updated: 2017-07-03
Packaged: 2018-11-22 23:49:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,594
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11390970
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elumish/pseuds/elumish
Summary: He gains 300 followers by the time he next looks at his phone, after practice that day. The picture has 690 likes and 112 comments.People keep calling him Daddy. It’s frankly a little alarming.





	otabek-altin started following you

**Author's Note:**

> There's hover text for the two sentences in Russian. Thank you xslytherclawx for fixing my Russian.

Otabek doesn’t understand social media.

He understands the mechanics of it, of course—he’s not old—but he doesn’t get why anyone would give a shit about the random minutiae of his daily life. He barely gives a shit about the random minutiae of his daily life, and he’s living it.

He keeps up a Facebook page so his fans can follow where he’s going to be competing, has a Twitter for the same reason, and has an Instagram because his sister Amina made one. He’s not really sure what’s on it, other than maybe one of the stock pictures of him. A picture of his interview from Worlds, maybe.

He follows Yuri on Instagram after Barcelona then, upon seeing an adorable cat and realizing he doesn’t actually have any of Yuri’s contact information, posts a picture and tags him in it. It can’t hurt, he figures. There’s nothing offensive in it. It’s just a cat.

He gains 300 followers by the time he next looks at his phone, after practice that day. The picture has 690 likes and 112 comments.

People keep calling him Daddy. It’s frankly a little alarming.

One of the people who follows him is Yuri, which he finds a little cool. More importantly, though, Yuri liked the picture of the cat.

Two days later when he goes back on Instagram—having shut off all notifications, because they made his phone otherwise unusable—he sees Yuri has tagged Otabek in a picture of his own cat, with the caption Моя кошка лучше, чем твоя. Otabek feels the need to comment with Не была моей кошки because, well, it wasn’t.

He ignores most of the rest of the pictures and videos Yuri posts, which are the only thing on his feed (wall? He can never remember which one is which) because Yuri is still the only person he follows, but when Yuri posts a slightly shaky video clearly taken by someone else of a successful quad flip, Otabek watches it twelve times and then likes it.

The thing is that Yuri is too young for him, and lives in a different country, and probably hasn’t given him more than two thoughts since Barcelona, but Otabek has always been content with pining from afar, so he just watches old YouTube videos of Yuri when he’s supposed to be sleeping and occasionally posts pictures of cats because he thinks they’ll make Yuri happy.

He knows his rinkmate Kulpynai thinks he’s a pushover because he cares more about the person he’s pining after being happy than about actually getting the person, but it’s not like they can be together anyway, especially not while they’re still competing, and so why not want him to be happy.

In Almaty, he trains almost exclusively with women mostly just due to a lack of men—and skaters in general—and it’s isolating despite their having somewhat adopted him. He lives in an apartment alone; he technically lives in the same city as his family, but they’re nearly 30 km apart, and free time is a bit of an illusion for a skater. Even when he’s not skating, he’s training or reviewing the day’s jumps or, when he needs a break, DJing.

He doesn’t DJ under his own name, because he’s a bit more well-known than he would like. It’s not that he’s not proud of his success, or that he’s not honored to represent Kazakhstan, but it can become a bit grating, dealing with people calling him the Hero of Kazakhstan.

A woman asked him to sign her bra, once. It was a truly uncomfortable experience, and he hopes to never do that again.

Yuri competes in the European Championships, placing first, and Otabek likes the Instagram picture of him on the podium. His SP wasn’t quite as good as at the GPF, but he landed all of his jumps in his FS, and he looks good. Happy. There’s a picture of him at the Kiss and Cry clutching a stuffed cat, waiting for his FS score, and he looks scared and excited and stunning, and Otabek considers saving the picture on his phone but decides that would be a little too creepy.

Otabek doesn’t expect to see him at the 4CC, because Russia doesn’t compete in it, but there’s a selfie of him at the Yangyang International Airport, looking exhausted as he makes a face at Nikiforov and Katsuki being affectionate as they wait for their luggage.

Yuri finds him in the hotel, picking listlessly at the rind of an orange and vaguely wishing Yuuri Katsuki had just retired so Otabek would have an actually chance at gold. Not that he isn’t going to try his hardest and strive for gold, but when Katsuki’s on top of his game, he could outskate Viktor Nikioforov.

Like Yuri.

“Am I seriously the only person you follow on Instagram?” is how Yuri greets him, and Otabek feels heat alighting his cheeks, because he hadn’t actually realized that other people could tell that.

But he just puts the orange down and shrugs, saying, “I don’t really use it, but I didn’t have any other way to contact you.”

Yuri stares open-mouthed at him for a second, then sits down across form him, pulling up his hood to avoid drawing attention to himself. Otabek can’t blame him. His fans are insane. “You could have just asked me for my phone number, you know. Or you—wait, did you start posting cats to show _me_?”

Otabek resists the urge to hunch his shoulders, picking at his orange peel with his thumbnail. Yuri’s nails are purple, he notices. He likes them. “You like cats. I thought you’d like the cat.”

“You’re so stupid.”

Otabek stares down at the table. He knows that, but it hurts to hear Yuri say it to him. He shouldn’t be too upset, though. Yuri doesn’t owe him anything, and as far as Yuri is probably concerned, they’re just competitors who have spoken a couple of times. “Sorry.”

“No, that’s—” Yuri snatches Otabek’s phone, then turns it around towards Otabek, saying, “Unlock this. I want to put my number in your phone, so you can actually _talk_ to me instead of just posting pictures of cats. Not that I don’t like the pictures of cats. I like cats. But you—I didn’t think you would want to talk to me because you’re, you know, you, but if you want to talk to me, there’s a better place to do it than with pictures of cats on Instagram. Not that you should stop posting pictures of cats.”

Otabek blinks at him, then unlocks his phone. Yuri puts his number in and saves it, then takes a selfie to set under his name. Then he texts himself with Otabek’s phone.

“Why don’t you post any pictures of yourself?” Yuri asks as he hands Otabek’s phone back. “You’re way more photogenic than most of the other skaters.”

Otabek shrugs, looking at Yuri’s selfie on his phone and trying not to smile at it. He has a picture of Yuri that’s just for him. That’s really nice. “Nobody wants to look at pictures of me.”

“Haven’t you seen all your fans asking for more pictures of you? They all want to look at pictures of you.”

That’s a surprise to Otabek, though he doesn’t really interact with his fans if he can help it. They only like him because he’s one of the only successful male skaters in Kazakhstan, not because of him. “I can, I guess.”

Yuri nods decisively. “You should.” A piece of hair falls in front of his eyes, and he brushes it aside with graceful fingers. Otabek looks away, because otherwise he’s going to stare, and he doesn’t want to be another one of those people who stares at Yuri because he’s so pretty and successful and amazing. “What’s wrong with you?”

“What do you mean?”

“You keep—” Yuri flicks his hand, stretching his legs out in front of him. His foot brushes Otabek’s ankle. Otabek doesn’t move his leg away. Neither does Yuri. “Not looking at me. Is there something on my face, or…?”

Otabek shakes his head. “No. I just don’t want to be creepy.”

“Why would that be creepy?”

Otabek really doesn’t want to talk about this, but he says, “I want to look at you, but you hide so people won’t stare at you.” Case in point, Yuri’s hood, which is nearly pulled tight around his face so it’s as covered as possible.

“I’m not trying to hide from _you_ ,” Yuri blurts out, then stops, pauses, and asks, “You want to look at me?”

“You’re stunning,” Otabek says before he can think better of it, because he’s an idiot.

Yuri’s entire face turns pink, and Otabek waits to get yelled at. He’d deserve it. He’s been basically online-stalking Yuri for months, and just admitted it to him. And with the amount of energy Yuri spends avoiding people’s attention, that can’t be something he wants to hear.

But then Yuri says, “Once this is done you need to meet Potya.” He stands, hands jammed in his hoodie pockets. “ _Davai_ , Otabek. Kick Katsudon’s ass.”

“Beka,” Otabek says before he can help himself. Yuri wants Otabek to meet his _cat_.

Yuri nods. “Beka. If you medal, you can call me Yura.”

Otabek grins at him. “If I get gold, I’m going to call you Yuratchka.” And then he ducks his head, because he can’t believe he actually said that out loud.

But Yuri just says, “Better get gold, then.”

**Author's Note:**

> So apparently this contradicts some canon regarding Otabek's Instagram established in the WTTM manga and another non-anime sources, but I don't care.


End file.
